Learning from the Future: A Resource for Planning Ahead – Five Stories of Community Foundations Using the Stress Test

What impact do the decisions of today have on your foundation’s future sustainability? How can you track strategic goals alongside their economic reality?

The Council on Foundations’ Community Foundations Leadership Team (CFLT) commissioned CF Insights and FSG Social Impact Advisors to create the ESP model as a forecasting tool in response to the economic uncertainty of 2008 and 2009.

In Learning from the Future: A Resource for Planning Ahead (PDF, 3.24MB), five community foundations share stories that highlight different motivations for using the ESP model, the way they see the future, and the decisions they are making. However, one thread is common throughout – having a picture of the future grounded in data helps them create or change the dialogue about what defines sustainability for their foundation in the months and years to come.